Friday Night and Saturday Mourning An EGB Prequel
by EGB Fan
Summary: A short character piece on Kylie as background to some other stories I have lined up. This examines the aftermath of the death of her Grandma Rose – and a past as I imagine it that the animation never got around to exploring.


_Extreme Ghostbusters **Prequel:**_** Friday Night and Saturday Mourning**

"Oh my God," murmured Steve Griffin. A notorious worrier, he began to run his fingers even faster through his short black hair as he heard his daughter's voice become increasingly distraught and distorted by tears, until finally the confused phone message tailed off completely.

Steve was already shoving files into drawers when he called his boss's secretary to tell her that he needed to speak with the man in charge urgently. She was unwilling to let the call through – evidently Barry Lyle was in another one of his famous meetings – but something in Steve's flustered tone must have made the young woman realise the urgency of the situation.

"Barry, listen, you have got to let me go tonight," Steve babbled into his office's cordless phone. "My grandmother's just died."

"Well I'm sorry to hear that," Lyle returned unconvincingly, "but it's Friday tomorrow. And if I recall, you've got a whole department to train up on that new software. After that you can go home for the weekend."

"No, you don't understand!" Steve persisted. "My daughter left me a message. She sounded really upset, and she's on her own. My parents are in friggin' California of all places and they'd never be able to get to her tonight, but I really don't think she should be by herself. God knows where my ex-wife is, like she'd even care – and I don't know what might happen if I don't go home now!"

"Steve," Lyle sighed wearily, "you really need to get yourself some stress balls or something. Why did you even bother calling me? You're obviously going tonight whether I say it's ok or not."

"Well, yeah," Steve admitted. "I really just need you to tell me if I'll still have a job to come back to."

"Oh... sure," Lyle relented, after a moment's thought. "If your kid really needs you then of course you have to go. I'll see about arranging cover for tomorrow – but I want you back here first thing Monday morning! There'll be somebody else to take care of your daughter by then, right?"

"Thanks, boss," Steve smiled gratefully down the phone. "See you Monday."

x x x

"I almost wish he'd said no," Steve later confided to his flatmate Richard, as he bundled a few emergency supplies into a battered old backpack (toothbrush, face flannel, the book he was currently reading, a CD Walkman... obviously he kept clothes at home). "I'll be coming back to a job I've been trying to jack in for the last ten years."

"It wouldn't help, you being unemployed," Richard pointed out from his position on the sofa, where he was lying flat on his back with a Coke can balanced on his chest. "You can still quit when you find a job closer to home."

"If I find a job closer to home," Steve said emphatically. "It was bad enough when Rose was looking after her, but now... argh!" he finished lamely, collapsing into an armchair when he realised that he had hardly the strength of will to stand.

"Come on, Steve, Kylie'll be fine," Richard smiled reassuringly. "How old is she now?"

"Seventeen," Steve's muffled voice wafted through the hands covering his face. He knew he must have looked as downtrodden as he felt, still in office-wear but minus the tie and jacket, his shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbow and his collar not only open but also distinctly skew.

"Well, there you go," reasoned Richard. "She can take care of herself now, right?"

"God, I hope so," Steve answered with feeling. "But I do worry about her, Rich."

"Yeah, I noticed," Richard said with a dry smile.

"It's just that it's been really tough for her," Steve went on. "First her mother left, and then a year later her friend Jack disappeared... I've given up asking if there's any news of him, poor kid. And now the one person she had left has gone and died!"

"She's still got you," Richard pointed out.

"Has she?" Steve asked rhetorically, in a very small voice. "I'm a lousy father. I haven't been around for her nearly as much as I should have been. I was even out getting coffee when she called to tell me about Rose. And now I'm going home for three days. That's it: three days to try and help her get over her grief and then I'm gone. I mean... is that really any better than what Jill did to her?"

"Don't be stupid," frowned Richard. "You need to stop being so hard on yourself. You do everything you can for Kylie."

"It's not enough," muttered Steve, getting to his feet and resuming his frenzied packing.

"Just don't start comparing yourself to Jill," Richard persisted. "She didn't even try. The woman gave up after six years!"

"I'm going to try and get hold of her," Steve decided. "Kylie might not like it at first, but she needs somebody with her and Jill's still her mother."

"Do you really think Jill will come back just because you ask her to?" Richard asked dubiously.

"I should damn well hope so, if I tell her what a state Kylie's in," Steve said determinedly, his dark brown eyes flashing with emotion. "I've always told myself that the reason she had no qualms about all this globetrotting she's been doing was because she knew Rose would take care of Kylie. But now Rose isn't here anymore, surely Jill will be able to see she's needed."

"Well, maybe," shrugged Richard. "I've never met the woman, but from what you've told me about her..."

"What?" demanded Steve.

"You just might have to do a bit of persuading, that's all," Richard finished.

"Yeah well..." muttered Steve, as he hoisted his backpack onto one shoulder. "If I'm going to get there tonight I'd better leave now."

"You know, you should try not to worry about Kylie so much," Richard said gently. "She's almost an adult now, Steve."

"Yeah, I know," sighed Steve. "But I still need to take care of her. She's all I've got. See you on Sunday night," he added with a small smile.

"Yeah." Richard returned the smile. "Bye."

x x x

Steve managed to get a fast train home and a taxi to his house, where Kylie and – until recently – his maternal grandmother had been living. Without him. As Steve placed his key in the lock, Richard's words echoed inside his head: "She's almost an adult now."

This was certainly true, and Steve had managed to miss out on seeing his daughter grow up. The fact that he had missed it and the guilt he felt for doing so broke his heart. He thought with fondness of the framed photograph he kept on his desk at work, taken at a time when things were not perfect, but Kylie had thought they were. The photo depicted her at five years of age, smiling happily with her arms around her father's neck. In the picture, Steve was smiling too, even though he must have known at the time that his marriage unlikely to last for much longer.

"Oh. Hey." Kylie blinked up at her father from her position on hands and knees by the small cupboard under the stairs. "I wasn't expecting you home yet."

"I had to come home," Steve told her. "You sounded really upset."

"I am really upset," Kylie said grimly. "But you could have waited 'til the weekend."

"What are you doing down there?" Steve asked, not unreasonably. His daughter's untidy black hair was pulled back into a ponytail and strewn with dust and cobwebs; her black jeans and t-shirt were smeared with all kinds of household dirt and grime, and her knuckles were almost as black as her chipped nail polish.

"Cleaning," shrugged Kylie, rising to her feet. "This place is in a terrible state, you know."

"Is it?" Steve sighed wearily.

He was not at all surprised to hear that his house was in a terrible state. After all, his life was in a terrible state: his family, his career (after all these years he was still a small fish in a very big pond), his fruitless quest for a second wife and the younger brothers and sisters he had wanted to give Kylie... so why shouldn't his house be in a terrible state as well? Especially since he was never there to look after it any more than he was there to look after Kylie.

"I called Gran and Granddad," Kylie reported, as she brushed balls of dust off the frayed knees of her faded jeans.

"Thank you, honey," Steve smiled weakly, making a mental note to call his parents as soon as he had a moment. "How'd Mom take it?"

"She seemed fine to me," shrugged Kylie. "Maybe a little upset, but I suppose they were expecting it. Gran said they won't come out here until the funeral."

Steve watched her expression carefully, and saw that she pursed her black-painted lips slightly as she spoke. It occurred to him that Kylie had come to look very like her mother. She had inherited Steve's straight black hair, but in no other way than that did she really resemble her father: she had Jill's small frame, round face, pallid skin tone and big green eyes – for all that she tried to hide this resemblance behind a mask of makeup. Steve sometimes wondered if his daughter deliberately tried to make herself look as unlike her mother as possible; he knew that she had been dressing down in black for a lot longer than she had been in mourning.

He was now worried by how detached she seemed. Steve remembered how distraught Kylie had sounded on his answering machine. What had changed since that afternoon? Perhaps she had simply had time to cry it out.

"Anyway, better feed Pagan," Kylie said expressionlessly.

Steve followed his daughter through to the kitchen and noticed how thin she looked. She had always been thin, of course. That was something else that she had inherited from Jill: natural skinniness. But these days there was little that Steve did not worry about, especially where Kylie was concerned.

"I could use something to eat," he lied, feeling far too neurotic about everything to want to eat. "Shall I make us some dinner?"

"I've eaten," Kylie told him simply.

"Have you?" Steve asked dubiously.

"Mhm," she nodded, smiling for the first time as her black-and-white cat trotted into the kitchen in response to the crack of the tin opener she was wielding. "I ordered a pizza."

Steve must have looked doubtful, because when she turned to look at him, Kylie's expression darkened and she saw fit to pull the lid off the kitchen bin, point at the empty pizza box resting on top of the heap of rubbish and say hotly, "See?"

"Good," Steve approved. "I'm glad you're... you know... ok."

"Yeah, well, I'll just have to get over it," shrugged Kylie. "Are you ok?"

"Obviously I'm sorry she's dead," Steve replied. "But she was nearly a-hundred. She had longer than most."

"Yeah, I s'pose," mumbled Kylie, casting her green eyes downwards.

In that moment she reminded Steve of that picture he kept on his desk. She was not smiling now, but she almost looked five years old again. Smiling fondly at her, Steve approached Kylie and put his arms around her, dropping a kiss on the top of her head. Height: that was something else that she had missed out on from his side of the gene pool.

"I have to go back to work on Monday," he told her gently. "What are you going to do until Gran and Granddad get here?"

"What do you mean 'do'?" Kylie frowned into his torso. "I'll carry on as normal. I'll be at school all day, it'll be fine."

"Are you sure you don't want some time off school?"

"Yes," Kylie answered darkly, seeming to take offence at this question and pulling away from him. "What else am I supposed to do? Anyway, I think it'll help to keep busy."

"Ok, sweetie, I was just asking," Steve said defensively. "But... well, are you sure you don't mind being on your own?"

"It doesn't really matter, does it, whether I mind or not!" retorted Kylie. "There isn't anybody who'll stay with me. I don't have a choice."

Unsurprisingly this triggered a fresh pang of guilt in Steve, and he heard himself blurting out quickly, "I'll stay!"

"Don't be stupid, Dad." Kylie rolled her eyes. "I'm old enough to take care of myself. And we still need money."

"But I don't want you to leave you here unhappy," argued Steve.

Kylie turned away from him and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like, "That never bothered you before."

"WHAT?" cried Steve, aghast.

"Nothing. Dad, you look pretty shabby," Kylie told her father. "You should go upstairs and take a shower and get changed or something. I'll make you a sandwich."

"You don't have to do that."

"I don't mind," Kylie insisted. "Hey, look, I'm sorry I've been a bit grouchy. I'm just..."

"I know, honey," Steve half-smiled at her.

"I really do appreciate you coming back," she added. "Thanks."

"No problem," Steve assured her, starting to make his way out of the kitchen and towards the stairs. "Hey – you know I love you, don't you?"

"Yeah," Kylie returned his watery smile. "I know."

Steve took Kylie's advice: he showered, ran a comb through his dark hair and pulled on an old pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. He felt better for all this, but soon started worrying again, this time about the phone call that he had promised himself he would make to his ex-wife. Unless he was prepared to go snooping around in her private possessions and risk getting caught, he was going to have to ask Kylie for a phone number.

However he put that particular task off until the following evening, kidding himself that it would probably upset Kylie if he started talking about her mother too soon. Instead he spent Friday calling relatives – including his just orphaned mother ("I'm sorry, Stephen, there's no way your father and I can get to Kylie before the end of next week...") – and starting on funeral arrangements. He had the house to himself, as Kylie was at school most of the day, so he was free to wander around worrying as much as he liked and also to sort through some of the clutter that was filling the place.

"Thanks," Steve smiled gratefully, late on Friday evening, as Kylie handed him a cheese and pickle sandwich. "So... um..."

"No, I haven't told Mom," Kylie sighed wearily, dropping herself down heavily next to her father on the sofa in the sitting room and starting on her own sandwich.

"What?" Steve reacted, startled. "How did you know I was going to ask that?"

"It's written all over your face," Kylie told him. "And besides, you always do that thing with your neck when you're going to talk about Mom."

Steve suddenly became aware that he was nervously massaging the back of his neck with his left hand. He had not realised that he was doing it, but now that Kylie had pointed it out to him he stopped instantly.

"Why should I tell her anyway?" demanded Kylie. "Jill won't care – she didn't even like Grandma Rose."

"Maybe not, but she'll care that you're grieving," reasoned Steve.

"Huh," snorted Kylie. "Will she?"

"I should damn well hope so. She's your mother!"

"She hasn't bothered to care about me for the last eleven years," Kylie pointed out; then she added emphatically, "At least! As I recall she didn't have much time for me even before she left."

"She loves you," Steve said imploringly.

"Says you."

"Of course she loves you, Kylie. But look, do you have a number for her or not?"

"Yeah," Kylie grudgingly admitted. "She's in Switzerland."

"Then let me call her," Steve pleaded. "I'd kind of like to talk to her myself."

"You?" Kylie looked sceptical. "What could you possibly want to talk to her about?"

"I think she should know," reasoned Steve. "And I know what'll happen if you tell her: it'll turn into a row."

"And it won't if you talk to her?" Kylie asked dubiously.

"It might not," shrugged Steve, preparing to take another bite of his sandwich. "I don't know – I haven't talked to her for five years."

"The number's on the fridge," Kylie relented. "Call her if you really want to. I don't care."

With that she stood and wandered out into the hall, where Steve could just see her through the doorway climbing into her black lace-up boots.

"Where are you going?" he asked anxiously.

"Library," Kylie answered simply. "I meant to go yesterday; there's a book I want to check out. And I need to get some bits of information so I can start applying for college."

"College?" frowned Steve. "You've got a whole year to worry about that."

"I have to apply as early as I possibly can," Kylie insisted, appearing in the sitting room doorway with one arm in her black trench coat. "There's a class at the New York City College I need to make sure I get a place in. Mind you," she added thoughtfully, "from what I hear it's not very popular..."

"What class is that?" Steve asked interestedly.

"Aw, Dad, you probably wouldn't approve," shrugged Kylie. "See you tomorrow."

"What makes you think I wouldn't approve?" Steve called after her, just as the front door slammed shut.

x x x

Though he had owned that house for nearly twenty years, it often felt strange to Steve sleeping in the bedroom that he had once shared with his wife. He had hoped that these feelings of unease would subside over time, but even after the bed that he and Jill had shared gave up the ghost and he was forced to buy a new one, Steve still felt strangely ominous on nights when he lay there alone.

He was not always alone, of course. Since Jill he had shared the old bed with Sally, Donna and Lily; and the bed he was in now had previously been occupied by Mary, Christine, Jennifer, Holly and Liz – and perhaps one or two others that he could not remember just at the moment.

All perfectly nice women, they had either ended their relationship with Steve because they found his neurosis too much to cope with, or because Steve had felt that they were not compatible with Kylie, whose feelings about such matters he always put before his own. Some ten years previously, he had hoped to remarry and have the children that Jill never wanted and refused even to consider. Then when Kylie was approaching her teens, Steve had set his sights on single mothers, hoping that a ready-made stepfamily would fill the void in his and his daughter's lives. But for some reason, that little fantasy had not quite worked out.

He could not pinpoint the exact time that he realised he had married the wrong woman. Now, lying fretfully awake and looking back on his life, Steve realised that that time must have been before either of them had broached the subject of children, because Kylie had been Jill's idea to try and make the unhappy marriage work. He knew now that he should have realised it would never work – he should have left her straightaway and started the family he wanted with somebody else – but he had agreed to try for a baby because it was his chance to get one of the things he wanted out of his shambles of a marriage.

Of course, Steve reflected, he was grateful to have Kylie. What he had said to Richard was quite true: she was all he had – and he was so glad he did have her, because he loved her more than anything. He would have liked to be closer to her, but his plan to find a job nearer to home and spend more time with his daughter had been another one of those things that did not quite work out. Thank God for Rose, he thought. Without her he would have had to move Kylie closer to where he worked. In truth Rose and Richard had both suggested this to Steve on more than one occasion, but racked with guilt as he was, he did not want to make things worse by uprooting his already troubled child.

x x x

Steve must have got to sleep eventually, because he didn't know at what time Kylie came home. She was still asleep when he woke up on Saturday morning, so he went downstairs and started making breakfast for them both.

The smell of bacon managed to rouse the sleeping Kylie, and she ambled downstairs in a white towelling robe. She looked tired, but she smiled appreciatively (if a little half-heartedly) as she sat and ate beside her father at the kitchen table. She looked different without her makeup – a lot more like her mother, in fact – and Steve noticed her red-rimmed eyes. It did not surprise him one bit to see that she had been crying.

"Thanks, Dad," Kylie smiled genuinely, standing to take her empty plate to the sink before stooping and kissing her father on the cheek. "I'm just going to take a shower."

"Are you ok?" Steve asked, still anxious despite the smiles he had seen.

"I'm fine," Kylie assured him. "See you in a few minutes."

When his daughter was safely out of earshot, Steve snatched the Post-it labelled "Mom" from the fridge and then went out into the hall, where he picked up the phone and punched out the number that would reach his ex-wife. He neither knew nor cared what time it was in Switzerland; he only cared that Kylie was unable to hear what he was saying to her mother, and that he knew it would stay that way for as long as he could hear the sound of running water wafting down the stairs.

"Hello?" a distantly familiar voice came from the earpiece.

"Jill, it's Steve."

"Steve?" The voice instantly took on a note of confusion and slight disapproval. "Why in God's name are you calling me? Is something wrong with Kylie?"

"Kylie's pretty much ok," Steve told his ex-wife. "Just very upset. Rose died on Thursday afternoon."

"Oh," Jill responded blandly. "Bad luck, Steve. Still, she was getting on a bit, you have to admit."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But it's hit Kylie really hard. She says she's ok, but..." he tailed off.

"Well if she says she's ok then she probably is ok," reasoned Jill. "Can I go now or was there something else?"

"What? No! Jill – listen to me," Steve gabbled desperately. "Kylie is really unhappy and I don't want to have to leave her alone when I go back to work on Monday."

"So don't go back to work on Monday," was Jill's advice.

"I have to," Steve frowned down the phone at her. "Somebody has to earn the money to look after our daughter, which is why I think me working is a little bit more important than you being in" – he checked the Post-it – "Switzerland."

There was a brief silence and then, "Stephen, I hope you're not suggesting that I go back there."

"Well, why not?" Steve demanded hotly.

"Because she was _your_ grandmother!" exclaimed Jill. "I didn't even _like_ the woman! It's nothing to do with me!"

"Rose may be nothing to do with you, but Kylie is!" argued Steve. He had been doing his best not to get angry, but he could feel his pulse beginning to rise as he shouted, "Do you really mean to tell me that you don't care if she's here on her own feeling depressed?"

"Don't you talk to me like that," Jill said tartly. "I'm in Switzerland, Steve, it's not exactly convenient."

"It's not exactly convenient you spending eleven years out of the country when you've got a daughter back home who needs you!" fumed Steve.

"Oh, she doesn't need me," Jill returned dismissively.

"She does need you, Jill," Steve insisted. "She's always needed you, but now she's really hurting and she needs you more than ever."

"I can't just drop everything and leave," argued Jill.

"Of course you can," Steve told her flatly. "She's your daughter. When she needs you you're supposed to drop everything – that's what parents do! I seem to remember it was your idea to have a child in the first place; I would have thought even you could accept some responsibility!"

"What responsibility? She's sixteen."

"Seventeen."

"Whatever. The point is she can take care of herself."

"Don't you love her at all?" Steve asked quietly.

"Don't be ridiculous," scolded Jill. "Now I'm sorry about your grandmother, but I've got things to do."

The line went dead. So did the shower noise coming from upstairs, but Steve didn't notice that. He simply stared aghast at the phone in his hand for a few moments before shouting angrily at it, "You bitch!"

"I guess we won't be seeing Mom any time soon, then," came a quiet voice from the top of the stairs.

Steve spun round in alarm and spent a few moments gaping in shocked surprise at Kylie as she padded down the stairs. She was still wearing the white towelling robe, now damp at the shoulders, and her dark hair clung wetly to her face and forehead. Steve could have kicked himself. Why had he let his guard down? Kylie was not supposed to hear any of what he said to Jill, let alone that. Even Jill had managed to miss hearing that.

Steve often had trouble remembering why he had felt hurt and upset when his wife announced that she was leaving him. Now was one of those times. Though he found it hard to believe now, he supposed he must have loved her. Of course when Richard had pointed out to Steve that he "must have loved her once," Steve had made a joke of the very idea: "Ye-es... I think it was a Tuesday."

"Um... no," he said apologetically to Kylie, replacing the receiver on its cradle. "I'm sorry, honey."

"Like I care," muttered Kylie – although Steve could see the sadness and disappointment in her face. However much she pretended not to, she still needed her mother sometimes.

"She does love you, Kylie," Steve told his daughter as he followed her through to the sitting room. "She's just..."

"A bitch who cares more about herself than she does about me."

"I was going to say busy," Steve frowned slightly.

"But she's not busy, though, is she!" retorted Kylie, picking up a book that had been carelessly left open on the sofa. "Sure, we'd all love to just drop everything and go gallivanting all over the world, but most of us have some sense of responsibility!"

"Kylie, don't," begged Steve. "Of course your mother loves you. And she misses you – just like I do when I'm not here."

Kylie opened her mouth and looked about to argue; but instead she just shook her head and mumbled, "Whatever, I don't care."

Time to change the subject, Steve thought. His eyes dropped to the object in his daughter's folded arms and he asked, "Is that the book you were so keen on?"

"Yeah," Kylie answered disinterestedly.

"What is it?"

Kylie wrinkled her nose and asked dubiously, "Why do you want to know that?"

"Because I don't know you as well as I'd like to," Steve told her truthfully. "I have no idea what you like to read about, and that actually kinda makes me feel bad."

"You wouldn't be interested," Kylie insisted.

"In what – you?"

"No – in this," and she indicated the book she was holding. "But you can look at it if you really want to."

With that Kylie bundled the thick hardback volume into her father's arms and then started to make her way upstairs. Steve looked down at the book's title – "Spengler's Spirit Guide" – and at once he started to worry again. What could this mean? Did it necessarily mean anything at all? It was obvious that Kylie had developed more than a passing interest in all things gothic, paranormal and generally weird... but had Rose's death affected her in ways that her father didn't realise?

Talking about feelings... well, talking about anything really, but particularly things like feelings... Kylie had never really been one for that kind of thing. Steve had always told himself that that was Jill's influence. The only feelings his wife had ever expressed were negative: "I hate you." "Why did I ever marry you?" "God, I hate being stuck in this god awful place!" "Why did you let me believe that having a child would make things better between us? I've had it up to here with both of you!"

Oh yes – Jill was the negative one. Steve... well, he could not quite convince himself that he was positive (every time his phone rang at home or at work an image of Kylie in the aftermath of a horrific car accident popped into his head), but he had been so sure that he was good at communicating his thoughts and emotions. But if that was true, why did he feel so uncomfortable about the conversation he was about to have with his own daughter?

With a pang of guilt and regret, he realised that it was probably because this was the first time he was to have such a conversation with Kylie. She had been a quiet child, and quieter still after Jack's disappearance. Steve flinched inwardly at the memory of the version of events Kylie had reported. He and Rose had managed to persuade her not to tell the police about demons at the window, and after the scared little girl had finally fallen into a fretful sleep they had stayed up for hours discussing whether she might not be the slightest bit crazy. Both knew that Kylie was no liar, and she certainly would not deliberately make up a story like that where Jack was concerned. There was no doubt in either of their minds that she had really believed what she was saying.

x x x

"Um... so..." Steve began tentatively, using the lamb casserole he was concocting for lunch as an excuse not to look at Kylie.

"What?" she asked disinterestedly from her position at the kitchen table.

" 'Spengler's Spirit Guide', huh?"

"Don't tell me you read it."

"Bits of it. Why, have you read it all the way through already?"

"Twice," Kylie answered blandly.

"But you only checked it out last night!" exclaimed Steve, in the same horrified tone of voice that he might use if his daughter was telling him that she had joined a coven.

"So?"

"So you can't have read it twice."

"I have," Kylie assured him. "Once last night and once this morning."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why did you read the whole thing twice?" Steve elaborated. "Is it good?"

"Obviously," Kylie snorted derisively.

Uh-oh. Time for the casserole to go in the oven. However Steve overcame his nervousness and took advantage of the situation, using the tree or four seconds in which his face was in the oven to ask, "Sweetie, do you remember when Jack disappeared?"

"Of course I do."

Steve turned and saw that Kylie was frowning at him. Oh dear...

"What about it?" she demanded hotly.

"Well... do you remember... what you told me and Grandma Rose?"

"Not specially," answered Kylie, wrinkling her nose in thought. "What did I tell you and Grandma Rose?"

"Um... you know... about the window..."

"Oh Dad, talk sense, will you?" snapped Kylie.

So she did not remember her demon story. There was something else for Steve to start worrying about.

"I know it must have been really difficult for you," he went on, taking a seat at the table opposite his daughter. "First your mom left - "

"Good riddance to bad rubbish," muttered Kylie.

"And then Jack," Steve went on. "I know I haven't been around as much as I should have been. I suppose Rose was all you had left..."

"Dad, I know all of this," interrupted Kylie, sounding intensely irritated. "What's your point?"

"Um... well..." stammered Steve. "All this stuff about ghosts you're suddenly into. You're not... I mean, you wouldn't..."

"Wouldn't what?" demanded Kylie. "Perform séances in the middle of the living room? I might," she added tartly. "I mean it's not exactly going to affect you, is it, seeing as you won't be here. Why should you suddenly start caring about what I do?"

"I always care about what you do," Steve told her, feeling stung. "And to be perfectly honest with you, Kylie, this ghost business worries me a little bit. Aside from what you might end up getting yourself into, I don't want you to be disappointed. Rose is dead. I'm sorry, honey, but you won't be seeing her again."

"Says you," retorted Kylie. "And what do you mean, 'what I might end up getting myself into'?"

"How much do you know about Egon Spengler?" Steve asked warily.

"Plenty," Kylie told him curtly.

"You must know that he was a Ghostbuster. Do you remember them?"

"Of course I remember them," Kylie snapped irritably.

"Well, back when they were still in operation... you weren't so interested in ghosts then."

"So?"

"So why now?"

"I read a lot of interesting stuff about Egon Spengler when I was looking at colleges, ok?" Kylie said defensively, folding her arms across her chest. "You don't have to be quite so narrow minded, you know. Spengler's theories are all perfectly scientific."

"This class you want to get into at the NYCC," Steve went on tentatively. "It wouldn't have anything to do with this Spengler guy or any of his nutty friends, would it?"

"They are not nutty! And it might," Kylie added in challenging tones.

"Look, sweetheart, don't get me wrong," Steve went on, trying to sound parental and reasonable. "I have no doubt that the Ghostbusters genuinely believed in what they were doing."

"Of course they did. And who's to say they were wrong?" demanded Kylie. "Just because you don't believe in ghosts, doesn't mean they don't exist. Egon Spengler is a helluva lot smarter than you, you know."

"Kylie, please, this wasn't supposed to be a row..."

"What exactly are you getting at here, Dad?"

"I just... I don't... I mean, if you're trying to get hold of Rose's spirit or something, and it doesn't work out, it'll break your heart."

"No it won't," Kylie was adamant. "I'm not trying to get hold of her anyway. It never even occurred to me. Well, maybe it occurred to me... But the point is, just because I can't reach her doesn't mean she's not there. Last night..."

Kylie stopped short, and Steve eyed her warily. Just what had she been going to say? Did she believe that she had seen Rose's ghost? It seemed a likely thing for Kylie to believe. She so wanted her great-grandma back.

"Last night what?" Steve asked slowly.

"I don't know. I just thought I felt something, that's all," shrugged Kylie. "And yeah, maybe Egon Spengler could tell me whether she was really there or not. But he's not here, is he, so you don't have to worry about it."

Could Kylie really be working towards trying to get her dead great-grandmother back again? As Steve had said, it could not have been easy for her; nearly everybody she loved went out of her life. That had to be why she had never even tried to make any more friends since Jack. As the months had turned into years his return looked less and less likely, and Jill's visits to her daughter were so rare and so fleeting that they might as well never happen. But of the three of them, Rose was the only one who would definitely not be returning... and yet she was the one that Kylie most wanted back.

"I wish I could just quit my job and stay here with you," Steve mumbled into his lap. "I'm really going to worry about you now Rose isn't here."

"You don't have to worry about me," Kylie told her own folded hands.

"No?"

"No."

"Are you happy?"

Kylie simply shrugged.

"What can I do to make this easier for you?" Steve asked sadly.

"Nothing," Kylie answered quietly. "Just let me believe that she's not completely gone."

Steve nodded slowly. There was no doubt in his mind that his grandmother was completely gone – but if Kylie wanted to believe otherwise, and if believing it helped her with her grief, where was the harm?

"You don't need to feel guilty about leaving tomorrow night," Kylie added, smiling slightly at her father. "I'll be fine."

"I wish you weren't by yourself," Steve maintained.

"It's fine," Kylie insisted. "Really. I'm fine. I don't need anyone."

Now it was Kylie's turn to pretend to be riveted by the lamb casserole. She watched it through the glass in the oven door, deliberately not meeting her father's eyes. Surely, Steve thought, she would never be ok with living alone at seventeen years of age. He only hoped that he was not disappointing Kylie as much as her mother disappointed her.

"If you ever need me, just call and I'll be here in two seconds," Steve said forcibly. Then he looked slightly sheepish and added, "Well... two hours."

"I know you will, Dad." She was still staring at the casserole. "Just don't go and get yourself fired over me or anything."

"You're more important than that stupid job," Steve was adamant. "I love you, Kylie."

"Yeah." Kylie's green eyes flickered on her father's harrowed face for a fleeting second before returning to the oven door. "I know you do."

THE END

Disclaimer: All rights reserved to Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and Columbia Pictures. All original characters are my own creation... whether or not it's a good idea to admit it. Thanks for reading. :)


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